H-1B visas

President Trump announced Tuesday that his administration is planning to unveil a program that lets foreigners acquire a path to citizenship for a one-time $5 million fee. Unlike the existing EB-5 visa program, which grants green cards to wealthy investors for about one-fifth of the cost, Trump’s “gold card” initiative aims to attract greater capital while using the revenue to help reduce national debt. “We’re going to be selling a gold card,” Trump said from the Oval Office during an Executive Order signing on price transparency in the hospital system.  “You have a green card. This is a gold card.

The nasty fight between Elon Musk and Steve Bannon over H-1B visas, meant for high-skilled workers, is the Ghost of Christmas Future. That’s not because the visas themselves will be a perennial problem. It’s because of three larger implications, foreshadowed by the visa dispute. One is the battle between populist nationalists (represented, in this case, by Steve Bannon) and growth-oriented American companies with extensive foreign markets. Those are led by hi-tech industries, represented here by Elon Musk, which benefit from bringing in foreign engineers, programmers and others. The second implication is that, in a country with only two major parties, there are bound to be major cleavages within each party on a wide range of issues.